Bicycle Travel Inspiration Stories: A story about a true hero

How you can go cycling with a severe handicap

It was my third
visit in China and I loved it. It seemed China was less difficult and more
mysterious then I had expected. I read books, saw pictures, films and even
tried to learn some of the language (which turned out to be very
difficult).

And then I met a man who change my life forever, a man with one
arm and one leg who showed me that cycling with a severe handicap was
possible. If he could do that, I could do that too. He was a true bicycle travel inspiration.

After traveling in Gansu and Sichuan I finally arrived in milder
climate. After all, it was only march in Dali now.

Gansu had been freezing, with snow and ice on the roads while Sichuan
was dry though still cold with about 10ºC. However, it felt like summer
after the freezing busses in north China.

Now in Dali the temperature had been up to almost 20ºC and it was
comfortable again. I had traveled by busses. Was it hard? In 1996 China
was already beginning to open up but many people at the country side were
still a bit suspicious to talk to foreigners. In Dali it was different.
Here had been tourist over the years and people were used to the "lao wai",
the Big Nooses.

Daishen died in July 2010

Daishen, the man who cycled Dalian-Dali 3 times died in Yangshuo in July
2010. He was sick for some time but early June it got worse. As one friend
in Yangshuo described: "Daishen got crazy and 3 days later he died.

May he rest in peace.

I stayed in Guesthouse No.4, a nice more traditional Bai houses. Here I
met a man who would change my life for the next ten years and probably for
many years more.

He had a big smile over his face and seemed to be perfectly happy. Little
I knew then about his life story.

He lived in a little town not far from Dalian, far in the north
east of China near the East China Sea. 12 years before I met him, it must
be around 1984, when he had been involved in a car accident. In that accident,
he lost his full left leg and his right arm. In China, this means trouble.
he had not been a "complete" man anymore. He told me he had lost his will
to live. After all, without an arm and a leg, he was no longer useful for
society.

One arm and one leg, ride your bicycle

In those days the facilities for disabled were
primitive. Someone told him if he couldn't do anything anymore he could
still become a monk.

After all, "monks don't need arms and legs for
prayers", his friend told him. So he went into a monastery.

He stayed a few years in the monastery and felt he was useful for
the community. In the monastery he learned to live with his handicap.

Even more important, he felt he found back pleasure in live. The main
problem now was, what could be do to serve his people?

As almost all Chinese people he had always rode a bicycle. He was thinking if
he could do something with a bicycle to be useful again. While in the monastery,
he had read books about people riding bicycles for fun. Could he do the same?
Riding a bicycle was one of the few things he still could do.

During his time in the monastery he had learned to accept his plastic
prosthesis. He could walk with it and even ride his old bicycle. So, if he
give his people an example that even an accident like his could be seen as
something positive, he may be an example for other people, give others
hope even if it seemed there was little hope anymore.

He left the monastery and bought a cheap mountain bike. He started to
cycle around on this one. There were problems, he had to find a way to
learn to cycle with his only available hand on the handlebars.

Another was his prosthesis of plastic. But after some time, it seemed he
was ready to do his next and much bigger idea.

The way he learned to work was to hold the pencil under his armpit
and do his work. It was a solid way to earn money while he was traveling.
And in every village, town or city he visited the post office to collect
a stamp. He carried with him a big Chinese flag with stamps of all the
places he had traveled.

But how did he travel? By car? No! By bus or train then? No again! He gave
himself the "impossible" task to cycle from Dalian to Dali, a
distance of around 3000 km. And while he started his journey alone, every
once in a while, people joined him for a day or sometimes more.

He wasn't a fast cyclist but he had one advantage over other cyclist
and travelers: the will to go! And so he went, on his bicycle. He cycled
from Dalian to Dali three times, which is about 10.000 km. Impossible?
This man was one of those real masters you meet in life. Although he was making a
living as a calligrapher, he was also a teacher, he was teaching "life".
Seeing him doing what he did, you learned a quick and important lesson:

EVERYTHING IS POSSIBLE,
IF YOU WANT IT.

Later I picked up cycling again. I had been cycling in Europe for many
years. Now I cycled in Asia too. And this man with one arm and one leg was
one of the reasons why I started cycling again. I met many people who told
me they couldn't do what I did. But I always told them about the one arm one
legged man. Anything is possible, if you want it.

I owe
him a lot, even though he probably doesn't know of my existence.
Unfortunately I have no clue what happened to him in between I left Dali
and when I saw him again in Yangshuo.

In Dali
he told me he wanted to write a book about his adventures. The book
would obviously be written in Chinese.

And although I have been back to China many
times since then, I never heard any news about this man, until I started writing
my Yangshuo website.
Our hero lived the last years in Yangshuo, where he had a little shop and
did his work at night in West Street.

Daishen died in June 2010. To me he was an example of man can do, where the limits are. And what the mind can let you do with your life if you want it. After reading this story, you can't tell me anymore: "I can't do that".
What you can tell me is: "I don't want it", but that is a different thing.

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